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The Great Grift: COVID-19 fraudster used stolen relief aid to purchase a private island in Florida

www.seattletimes.com COVID-19 fraudster used stolen relief aid to purchase a private island

Patrick Parker Walsh is one of thousands of thieves who perpetrated the greatest grift in U.S. history — potentially plundering more than $280 billion in federal COVID-19 aid.

COVID-19 fraudster used stolen relief aid to purchase a private island

The stolen funds financed the high-rolling lifestyle of Lee E. Price III, a Houston resident with prior felony convictions for forgery and robbery. He swindled nearly $1.7 million by submitting bogus aid applications on behalf of businesses that existed only on paper, according to court records.

Price wasted little time blowing $14,000 on a Rolex and more than $233,000 for a flashy white Lamborghini Urus, a luxury SUV that can go from zero to 60 mph in three seconds. He also spent thousands of dollars at the Casanova, a Houston stripclub. Price was sentenced to more than nine years in prison.

Vinath Oudomsine of Georgia also created a fake company that he claimed made $235,000 a year and had 10 employees. A few weeks after Oudomsine applied for the pandemic aid, the government rushed him $85,000 to keep his non-existent business afloat.

Oudomsine spent nearly $58,000 on a 1999 Charizard Pokémon card

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